Data shows that smartphones and tablets have been adopted far faster than PCs.

Back in 2005, we charted 30 years of personal computer market share to show graphically how the industry had developed, who succeeded and when, and how some iconic names eventually faded away completely. With the rise of whole new classes of "personal computers"—tablets and smartphones—it's worth updating all the numbers once more. And when we do so, we see something surprising: the adoption rates for our beloved mobile devices absolutely blow away the last few decades of desktop computer growth. People are adopting new technology faster than ever before.

Humans are naturally competitive creatures. Not only do we compete with each other for money and power, but we form strong allegiances to various tribes. Whether it's a favorite sports team or a chosen computing platform, we passionately cheer when they win and feel a punch in our guts when they lose. Companies know this, and they will trumpet their successes and quietly hide their failures. But is it any more important to want one multi-billion dollar company to win over another than it is to root for one arbitrary multi-million dollar athlete? Is it anything more than cheerleading?

Ars previously on market shares

Well—there's certainly plenty of cheerleading, but tracking the rise of fall of market share over time has more serious uses, too. Software developers need to keep track of market share so they can decide where to invest their resources. Consumers may then choose platforms based on software availability. Platforms can live—and sometimes die—by market share. The successes and failures of one generation of platforms affect the next, and ultimately this has an impact on everyone's digital lives.

Certain lessons from the past can also be applied today, and may even foreshadow what the future holds.

So what is market share?

Market share is typically defined as the percentage of a company's product compared to the total of all products sold in that category over a given period of time. For example, if Pepsi sold 25 percent of all brown carbonated soft drinks in the third quarter of 2010, it would be said to have a 25 percent market share for that quarter.

This sort of measurement works well in the beverage industry. The product is inherently disposable and shifts in market share are small. When you move from carbonated sugar water to the computer industry, as former Apple CEO John Sculley did in 1985, things get considerably more complicated.

In addition to market share, there's the concept of installed base. For computers, this would be the ratio of one brand or platform that is currently in use compared to the total number of computers in existence. This gets a lot trickier to calculate, because computers are being retired all the time at uneven intervals, and the time they spend being used is also highly variable. Still, it's an important thing to consider for computer companies, especially if they are trying to break into an already-established market. It's great if you have a ten percent market share in the first quarter that you sell your new product, but what if the industry has been around for years and countless millions of a competitor's devices already dominate the landscape?

Many articles on market share confuse the two terms. Some report on installed base using surveys of small groups of users, or look at the server logs of a few websites, and then announce this as market share. Neither of these two methods is especially accurate, and can sometimes produce questionable conclusions. The only reliable way to measure market share is to painstakingly count up all the sales of every product in a single quarter (this article will primarily use this method).

The other place where confusion can reign is in cherry-picking the regions used to provide the data. Companies with dwindling global share will often point to countries where their sales are still strong, or report only retail sales if their direct channel isn't doing as well. To be fair to everyone, the numbers I am using are for worldwide sales through all channels. With that said, let's begin by returning to the early days of the "personal computer" revolution.

The personal computer (Triassic Period)

We tend to forget that the personal computing industry, a cornerstone of the modern world that sells hundreds of millions of units every year, was largely created by a few disaffected nerds in their garages. Established mainframe and minicomputer companies took years even to notice the personal computer. When they finally entered the market, they had decidedly mixed results.

The first true "personal computer" was the Altair, invented in 1975 by Ed Roberts. It established most of what came to define the industry: the desktop form factor with attached peripherals, an internal expansion bus for add-on cards, a third-party software ecosystem with Microsoft providing the primary user interface (which in those days was a BASIC interpreter), and various conventions and computer fairs where users and vendors could meet.

Because anyone could enter the market with very little startup cost, the early years of the personal computer featured a dizzying array of models. I once took a copy of a 1980 issue of Computers & Electronics and counted over a hundred different incompatible machines advertised inside. This Wild West landscape couldn't last for long. Most early companies failed to make the transition from garage to global business.

Four winners emerged from this early era: the Atari 400/800, the Radio Shack TRS-80, the Commodore PET, and the Apple ][. The latter was in last place for the first few years, until a happy accident gave it the industry's first killer app: the spreadsheet VisiCalc. The PET soon gave way to the VIC-20 and the enormously popular Commodore 64, the first personal computer to really make an impact on the mass market. It would go on to sell 22 million units, which would still be a respectable number for a single new computer model today.

The early market was also much more regional than it is now. The Sinclair ZX-80, ZX-81, and later the Spectrum sold well in their native United Kingdom, but made a smaller dent in the US. Similarly, the Apple ][ sold in much smaller numbers in Europe. The UK had its own unique ecosystem of computers, including the popular BBC Micro, branded after the national broadcaster.

The young industry was shaken to the core when IBM introduced its own Personal Computer in 1981. The IBM PC, Model 5150, wasn't particularly impressive at launch. It was expensive, and while it did sport a 16-bit CPU capable of addressing up to 1MB of memory, it was underpowered, had no graphics capabilities out of the box, and had no sound chip. Compared to a much cheaper and more colorful Commodore 64, it hardly seemed like a contender.

Two things changed the fate of the IBM PC: the IBM brand name and the clones. Ironically, the PC was easy to clone mostly because it was so uncomplicated, and it was uncomplicated because it had been hastily designed from off-the-shelf parts to get to market before some other computer maker took the market away from IBM forever. It had no custom chips, just a CPU hooked up to some RAM and an expansion bus that was fully documented so that third parties could create add-on cards. The only proprietary bit was a simple chip containing the BIOS (Basic Input/Output System) code that started the machine up and told all the parts how to communicate with each other. Even the operating system was off-the-rack, a hasty CP/M clone purchased by Microsoft.

Competition between the clones brought the price of the PC down, and add-on cards filled the gaps in functionality from the original model. The market story from 1981 to 1985 is largely about the PC—and we could call it a single market because the clones were absolutely, 100 percent compatible—slowly taking more and more market share. Other platforms, including the venerable Commodore 64, fell off.

35% of people in the US don’t have Internet access at home. 59% of Americans who make less than $30,000 have no Internet access at home. 88% of Americans without a high school diploma don’t have Internet access at home.At the same time, 88% of people have a mobile phone. The number of people that use their phone to access the Internet went from 31% (2009) to 55% (2012).

I have 5 computers at home, yet I too feel the PC has a limited future. I love computers because like @cateye above I remember the good old days of the late 80s.

One notable difference between the PC market and the smartphone/tablet market is the accelerated time scales that mark their evolution.

Early PCs only appealled to a few who saw the potential. Today computers are actually useful for the majority, especially as communications devices.

Conflating phones with tablets is stupid. People buy "smart" phones to satisfy a primary purpose that has nothing to do with the fact that those devices are also general purpose computers. Adoption of smart phones is just the evolution of the cell phone market which is rather well established at this point.

Looking into the future I can see the smartphone dying off (relatively speaking) with such potential technologies as Google Glasses and/or an iPod nan watch taking over much of the responsibilities of a phone. Virtually every single person I've talked to prefer the experience of using a touchscreen tablet over the phone. ...SNIP..

I think the 5´5 phones are going to take over and ppl. are just going to get used to them. Docking them and using them as a desktop is going to take the place of many laptops and desktop computers today.

That seems like a reasonable possibility. The phones have enough power to work as many people's desktop. With a NAS at work/home (which could be a cloud service) the lack of storage isn't an issue.

To make this happen either Android needs to play catchup to the desktop world, people need to be okay with a different OS for their desktop use, or Microsoft needs to get x86 phones on the market with Windows 8.

I suspect many home users are just not going to replace their current desktop/laptop and will end up with a tablet, or making due with their phones.

I think that the smart phones and tablets will get people over the idea that you need Microsoft to compute. This may allow for a market correction where the idea of having a single platform monopoly goes away. Or we might just end with a new monopoly.

Android and PhoneOS really don't need to "catch up" to Windows. They have already demonstrated to many people that Microsoft is entirely optional.

Probably the most advanced computer from the 1980s overall. Mine, by the time I put it in the garage, had voice recognition and commands, speech synthesis, a 1MB RAM Disk that could act as the 1980s equivalent of todays SSDs, Floppy Disk, Tape, Pascal emulation, multiple joysticks and trackballs (and support for the old Atari 2600 style that are known and loved).

Great machine.... shame it got abandoned by TI in 1984; the 99/8 was looking to be the big competition for the C64. And there was a TI-99/4B model, too, but it was very rare.

I know some folks who upgraded there TI-99/4As to TI-99/8 basis using the PEB upgrades circa 1987ish. One still runs his that way.

The adoption rates of tablets and smart phones is far higher than the initial adoption rates of computers in peoples homes is because it is an extension of what people are already used to. It's the same thing only smaller. So there is a basic understanding of their purpose.

When I decided to go into electronics and computer science way back when, everyone thought I was crazy. And having my own computer in my house? Insane, since nobody actually has a need for one. I was urged to go into a more practical line of work for my career, since computers and the industry had a limited future.

But, I didn't listen fortunately. And time has proven my choice was the right one.

I still have my old Apple ][+ laying around. And I fire it up once in a while for a little Choplifter and Kareteka. Plus maybe Lode Runner or some of the SSI simulations. My Amiga 2000 gets a workout from time to time as well. Another great machine. It's just too bad Commodore bought the company that designed it, since their marketing was awful.

The wrong lessons are being drawn about platforms. Everyone looks at 1995-2005, focuses on Windows, and says "network effects!", it is not Windows that is interesting to focus on and, consequently, it is not the lesson to draw.

The interesting thing is that despite the almost two decade 95%+ marketshare of Windows, at least two other platforms – Linux and Mac – consistently remained capability-competitive with Windows. In other words, there were never very many things you could do with a Windows machine that you could

Apple was already an established player before the first IBM PC. Apple's 8-bit platforms were still lingering on into the 32-bit era. You could see a "hackintosh" being sold for less than the current iteration of the Apple 2. Apple managed to coast on inertia. They also already had a complete platform long before Windows 95 came out. If anything, it was Microsoft to try and reach feature parity with Apple.

Linux and free software in general is something else. It does not depend on the market. It doesn't depend on corporations. It's users are also it's maintainers. So saying that Linux refutes the notion of network effects is very disengenuous.

Free software avoids entirely the problem of being dependent on a Tramiel or DeGasse.

If anything, it is the web that broke the cycle. Many things that were once for-DOS-only proprietary binaries suddenly became something that anyone with a web browser could use. Suddenly someone with an Amiga had equal footing with a Windows user.

The web is the real equalizer and it's something that helps the adoption of smart phones and tablets as alternative computing platforms.

It isn't fair to mention the iPad and forgot about tablets like the Nexus 7. Seriously, have you tried one yet? $200 gets you one of the smoothest and most capable touch devices ever to hit the market PERIOD. It rivals the iPad on every facet and is 50% of the price or more cheaper.

I think it's too soon to declare the smartphone the victor. While smartphone sales are through the roof, they are largely filling an untapped market; people replacing "dumbphones" if you will. Desktop and laptop computer sales are largely re-sales to existing users.

The real future I think is in the global south, where electricity and phone and internet access are unreliable even when present. Phone are HUGE down there -- but the always-connected smartphone won't quite fit the bill. I think if the smartphone can evolve into a product which is more friendly to offline users, more robust and more power efficient, but still has the featureset of a smartphone as mini computer, it could inspire a technology revolution outside the developed world.

If I were running RIM, this is where I would focus my development. RIM is closer than anyone else to this right now.

Indeed, right now the mobile market needs a significant revolution in wireless communications. Every technology we have right now is the chief bottleneck, due to combinations of range, latency, and bandwidth (Wifi/3G/4G). Unfortunately, even in academia, nothing world changing is anywhere near the starting gate, such as quantum communication.

As far as RIM goes, Southern hemisphere infrastructure would be great for their involvement. I also think they could leverage themselves more heavily into niche industrial markets, such as 3G/4G machine connectivity and push-to-talk.

Unless they change their focus and come up with the world's most secure, encrypted, and remotely manageable / deployable Android or Windows 8 phone, they don't really stand a chance against the rest of the smartphone industry to keep much of the enterprise segment. Frankly, enabling enterprise management and security of Android or Windows 8 handsets would be a windfall for whoever pulled it off right the first time. I haven't seen enough material from Microsoft to believe that Windows 8 phones will have the enterprise level AD integration and management necessary to grab that market segment.

Great read. Makes me excited to be alive! We've come so far in terms of mobile or personal computing power, who knows what the next 10 years will bring! Every once in a while I still amaze myself that I can peruse the internet/watch movies in almost any location I find myself at any time of the day on my phone. Its stuff I dreamed about as a kid. I'M WATCHING MOVIES ON MY PHOOONE!!! (in hd!)

The Post PC era seems almost reasonable if you think in terms of mere consumption, but for those of us who make a living producing and working on a PC/Mac it just doesn't seem accurate.

I find myself wondering if we will ever see a kind of expandability that the ISA bus offered on the PC for phones. I guess one way that can happen is via some kind of micro-thunderbolt. Or maybe if they start sporting USB 3 OTG/host.

But given that, it worries me that Google is moving away from expandable storage and insisting on a Apple-like "the user should not care about files and folders" attitude.

Google has always had that attitude with Android. I don't like the move either, but as a Desire user I understand it. Because HTC was incompetent (and I suppose I was too for buying it) I spend a good 5 minutes a day just managing storage space so that I can keep the apps I have. I have gigs of free space, but all of it's on the SD card.

I've seen less savvy users really struggle with it. They never run updates, they don't install new programs and then they still end up living with a perpetual low storage notification.

My bigger concern is with companies that think you don't need to be able to service the battery.

Android has up until recently liked SD cards, but it never was done very well, with them later having apps on SD cards that didnt' quite work.

Today's devices like the nexus devices or Asus transformer can still have their native storage accessed just like before, only using MTP. But unlike before it works just the same as MSC without holding the host device hostage while you use it. It also eliminates needing to use a FAT or NTFS partition.

I don't like how Linux has issues with it since it is a MS protocol, but I just use a web based app to transfer files over wifi in those cases.

Funny you mention HTC. At least with the Sensation I have plenty of space for apps and music on the card.

One notable difference between the PC market and the smartphone/tablet market is the accelerated time scales that mark their evolution.

Early PCs only appealled to a few who saw the potential. Today computers are actually useful for the majority, especially as communications devices.

Conflating phones with tablets is stupid. People buy "smart" phones to satisfy a primary purpose that has nothing to do with the fact that those devices are also general purpose computers. Adoption of smart phones is just the evolution of the cell phone market which is rather well established at this point.

The entire thesis of this article is numerical cookery.

Add to it this stupid meme and I'm inclined to believe you.

Quote:

Google hastily altered development of its mobile Android platform from being a Blackberry look-alike to being an iPhone work-alike.

And no, I'm not going to do the work of pulling out 4 different threads here for proof. Google it yourself.

Linux survived because it found an enormous external market in the server room, which in turn subsidises its minor desktop presence. Mac survived because the market is highly heterogeneous, allowing it to find certain niches (e.g. print publishing)

Of course, Mac and Linux survived as full-fledged, feature competitive platform alternatives to Windows – i.e. without evolving to be optimised for print publishing or servers. Given that this is the case, what is the alternative you are proposing? That full-fledged platforms can flourish despite tiny marketshares when they can find "certain niches"? Then that would be exactly what I said, minus the degree of specificity that makes my proposal useful, as without the specificity the explanation becomes equivalent to "the platforms that survive, survive".

Regarding the bit on Page 3 concerning whether iOS vs. Android is a repeat of Mac vs. Windows - it is, it's already over, and Apple lost again. This isn't a reflection on the tech (entirely), it's a reflection on the price point and availability. Over the next few years I expect Android phone marketshare to continue to widen the gap with iOS, and tablet marketshare to eventually track closely with phone marketshare. There's simply a bigger potential customer base when you have a wide selection of products at varying price points, vs. 3-4 models that are effectively identical at a premium price point. I've found Android 4.x to be extremely impressive and a massive improvement from 2.3 and currently far superior to iOS, at least until 6 comes out. The lack of a compelling Android tablet until recently has certainly slowed things down.

I don't believe Apple will have to be content with a Mac-like 5%-10% marketshare (far from it), but they'll be well under 50%. The wildcard will be Windows 8 and MS' attempt to create an appealing convertible form factor with Surface - they could legitimately upset the apple cart (no pun intended) and establish a solid 3-way split in the market, although I still think Android will be the biggest of the 3 for the foreseeable future.

It's over? Who blew the whistle? I think you're forgetting that the game never ends.

Sure... if you take a snapshot of the market... Apple has "lost" as you said.

But who cares? Apple will be selling products for the rest of our lives.

Just look at the Mac... after 27 years they're still around. And Apple is selling the most Macs ever in its 27 year history.

As for phones... do you ever think there will be a day when Apple sells ZERO phones? I doubt it.

You say Apple "lost" and I'll say Apple is #2

There is a #2 in every industry. And that's perfectly fine.

Please read my comment more carefully. "Win/lose" in the sense that the DOS/Windows PC won and the Mac lost in the battle for desktop dominance, and that's being repeated with Android and iOS. I specifically said that I expect iOS to settle at a far higher marketshare than Mac ever has had or will have. I most certainly never even approached anything resembling a claim that Apple or iOS would cease to exist.

As far as who will be #2 long-term, that depends entirely on Microsoft and their execution with Win8 and their tablet/convertible strategy. Today I'd have to say that I'd expect it to shake out as Android #1, iOS #2, and WinX #3, but crazier things have happened.

So was Atari. What made the Mac succeed where Atari did not? I would argue it was because the Mac provided a way that allowed Apple and many Apple developers to make enough money to continue expanding the platform, despite a comparatively trivial market share. Basically, Mac users were more willing to pay more money provided their specific needs were being met.

JEDIDIAH wrote:

Apple's 8-bit platforms were still lingering on into the 32-bit era. You could see a "hackintosh" being sold for less than the current iteration of the Apple 2. Apple managed to coast on inertia.

I'm not sure I understand. "Coasting on inertia" is what I would call IE or BB OS today – a once highly dominant (in terms of market share) platform not reaching the levels it would had been at had it not once been dominant. The Mac was never the really dominant computing platform. And it's rather difficult to coast on inertia for 28 years

JEDIDIAH wrote:

If anything, it is the web that broke the cycle. Many things that were once for-DOS-only proprietary binaries suddenly became something that anyone with a web browser could use. Suddenly someone with an Amiga had equal footing with a Windows user.

I can see the argument for "a platform will have some users provided it is able to perform the critical task of the day sufficiently well" (today, web access). I am not sure how that would translate into people continuing to be motivated to expand the platform's capabilities to perform other tasks, however... especially if network effects are what explains platform viability.

Having been in the industry starting in the 70s, you totally missed the S-100 and SS-50 systems that people built at home or ordered pre-built from the manufacturer. I can only recall my system from a company called Smoke Signal Broadcasting during that era. It was exciting when the Commodore Pet, the TRS-80 and the Apple came out. Not to burst today's fanboy bubble too much, but more people bought TRS-80s and Commodore Pets, because the Apple was just too darned expensive. Anyway, it was an exciting time to actually have your own personal computer.

I Haven't read the comments yet so my apologies if this has been noted already, but in regards to the following paragraph in the article:

Quote:

adoption rates for our beloved mobile devices absolutely blow away the last few decades of desktop computer growth. People are adopting new technology faster than ever before.

The biggest and most obvious reason for this is that the Baby Boomer generation for whom computers still mean what they were in their childhood, ie rooms full of strange humming, blinking lights and bank after bank of reel-to-reel tape populated by white-robed wizards and and black-suited government spooks is dying off, and the generation X population that grew up with the first generation of home consoles and personal computers are now at the peak of their earning and spending potential.

Not to mention the Screenagers who were born with a cell phone in one ear and a keyboard in the other, not ever knowing anything BUT personal computers and comms devices coming into their own earning power. This should be an obvious thing to anyone, layman or journalist alike.

"In any event, it pretty much guarantees that the mobile devices we have a decade from now will be unbelievably sweet."

This reminds me of talking to friends during the mid-90s about how awesome it would be if CPUs could run at 1GHz and above. Now we have 4GHz+ 8 core CPUs and seperate GPUs even more powerful than CPUs 10 years ago. Sometimes it crazy to think that my smart phone is more powerful than my first computer (a home built 286) at 1/50 the size.

I think its great smart phone adoption is so high as when everyone has access to the internet maybe we can finally start on that "paperless future". I'm tired of filling out 20 papers at the beginning of the school year for my kids, why can't I do it all online? Oh that's right there is still a good 20% of the general population without internet access. In a dense urban area like the one I'm in there is no reason it shouldn't be almost 100%.

In the post PC era, where everyone has tablets and smartphones, what are the developers using to write the apps that makes people want these things in the first place.. Oh yeah PCs. What are the things that people fall back on to do actual work and not browse the web or play angry birds? Oh yeah PCs.

I don't care if you use Mac or Windows or Linux, but the notion that we are in a post PC era, when there isn't a single person I know who has a tablet or smartphone INSTEAD of a PC, is just silly.

I think Windows 8 is the first tablet device that someone would buy and then not need a PC anymore, but that is mostly because of its hybrid nature (on the x86 side of things anyway).

I don't care if you use Mac or Windows or Linux, but the notion that we are in a post PC era, when there isn't a single person I know who has a tablet or smartphone INSTEAD of a PC, is just silly.

Jurrasic made a good point above about generational shift. When the younger cohort is spending 90% of their eyeball time with mobile devices, it's very unlikely they're going start using PCs except in situations where they absolutely have to. More complex games and applications will move to mobile because that's where the users are.

It's like when I first got into the job market and industry rags like "Computerworld" were filled with news about MVS, VMS, OS/400 and so on. I didn't care about that stuff, in my mind it was on it's way out (and in the general case, I was completely correct, even though mainframe/mini still hang around in enterprise). As the younger folks enter the job market, they're not going to care about the PC, it's "done", old legacy tech.

It's interesting to note that the great innovator Samsung is not mentioned in this article but the copyist Apple is. Given that Apple contributed nothing to the industry and just patents obvious ideas. Ars should not give such credit to patent trolls like Apple. The iphone and ipad were nothing special. Everything in them were obvious. Anyone could have told you in 2007 that phones would be like the iphone. Nothing was changed. There was no evolution. The same goes for the ipad it was completely obvious (rounded rectangles LOL!). Ars needs to be less biased towards Apple and talk more about true innovation from Samsung.

There's huge amounts of DIY electronics development out there these days, it's just not about building your primary computing device anymore. And there's so much less platform fanboyism over there too, it's quite refreshingly mature.

Regarding the bit on Page 3 concerning whether iOS vs. Android is a repeat of Mac vs. Windows - it is, it's already over, and Apple lost again. This isn't a reflection on the tech (entirely), it's a reflection on the price point and availability. Over the next few years I expect Android phone marketshare to continue to widen the gap with iOS, and tablet marketshare to eventually track closely with phone marketshare. There's simply a bigger potential customer base when you have a wide selection of products at varying price points, vs. 3-4 models that are effectively identical at a premium price point. I've found Android 4.x to be extremely impressive and a massive improvement from 2.3 and currently far superior to iOS, at least until 6 comes out. The lack of a compelling Android tablet until recently has certainly slowed things down.

I don't believe Apple will have to be content with a Mac-like 5%-10% marketshare (far from it), but they'll be well under 50%. The wildcard will be Windows 8 and MS' attempt to create an appealing convertible form factor with Surface - they could legitimately upset the apple cart (no pun intended) and establish a solid 3-way split in the market, although I still think Android will be the biggest of the 3 for the foreseeable future.

It's over? Who blew the whistle? I think you're forgetting that the game never ends.

Sure... if you take a snapshot of the market... Apple has "lost" as you said.

But who cares? Apple will be selling products for the rest of our lives.

Just look at the Mac... after 27 years they're still around. And Apple is selling the most Macs ever in its 27 year history.

As for phones... do you ever think there will be a day when Apple sells ZERO phones? I doubt it.

You say Apple "lost" and I'll say Apple is #2

There is a #2 in every industry. And that's perfectly fine.

Please read my comment more carefully. "Win/lose" in the sense that the DOS/Windows PC won and the Mac lost in the battle for desktop dominance, and that's being repeated with Android and iOS. I specifically said that I expect iOS to settle at a far higher marketshare than Mac ever has had or will have. I most certainly never even approached anything resembling a claim that Apple or iOS would cease to exist.

As far as who will be #2 long-term, that depends entirely on Microsoft and their execution with Win8 and their tablet/convertible strategy. Today I'd have to say that I'd expect it to shake out as Android #1, iOS #2, and WinX #3, but crazier things have happened.

Sorry... I was focused on "it's already over" and "Apple lost again" and those sounded like doomsday predictions for Apple and I was just wondering what the result is.

The truth is... the Mac NEVER had a dominant position in on the desktop. So they didn't really "lose" anything... it had more to do with Apple not wanting to compete in the "cheap PC" market.

But look how it turned out... Windows has become a commodity... and PC makers are all fighting with each other in a race to the bottom.

Windows has the market share... but the PC makers themselves are struggling.

Apple's doing just fine in the PC market... despite their tiny desktop market share. That's why I was saying you don't necessarily have to be #1 to matter.

You're right... Android vs iOS will turn out like Windows vs Mac. There are so many PC manufacturers... and look at how many of them are having trouble making money selling $399 laptops.

It's interesting to note that the great innovator Samsung is not mentioned in this article but the copyist Apple is. Given that Apple contributed nothing to the industry and just patents obvious ideas. Ars should not give such credit to patent trolls like Apple. The iphone and ipad were nothing special. Everything in them were obvious. Anyone could have told you in 2007 that phones would be like the iphone. Nothing was changed. There was no evolution. The same goes for the ipad it was completely obvious (rounded rectangles LOL!). Ars needs to be less biased towards Apple and talk more about true innovation from Samsung.

Copying other peoples products isn't innovation. And Samsung has been a copycat for their entire existence. If the iPhone and iPad were so obvious, then why wasn't anyone else there to make them first? Feature phones don't count. Neither do poorly performing tablets trying to run a desktop OS.

RIM is in the middle of a difficult operating system transition and Nokia killed off its Symbian line of smartphones to switch entirely to Windows Mobile Phone 7, which has been a disappointment of colossal proportions. Windows 8 may change the game somewhat, but it will likely be too little and too late. Windows was never about the brand name—it was about ubiquity and application availability, neither of which will apply to Windows 8 tablets. It might simply be that the world has moved on.

RIM is in the middle of a difficult transition of management, not OS. It was run by a pair of clowns who enjoyed great early success and then ran the company into the ground. RIM's market share (by any definition) has been in a downward spiral.

Nokia hasn't killed off Symbian, but it was never a smartphone platform. Maybe you missed your own graphs that showed it also in a steady decline. Symbian needed to be replaced. Nokia has barely begun the transition to Windows Phone, but already it has seen the sales of its WP devices increase by 100% in each of the last three quarters. They have a long long way to go, but the end is not as near as you make it out to be.

And Windows Mobile Phone 7 was never the name of anything. WP7 has been a disappointment, but colossal is a pretty heavy handed word for a platform that is one of only a couple that is currently GAINING market share. Will it ever surpass Android? Likely not, but that doesn't make it a failure.

I don't like the way the data is presented - it assumes a perfect sample size over time. This is one of the key problems with frequency-dependent normalization schemes. It also forces correlations between two products that may not be related because the data of one product (iPhone) incorporates variation from another number (Android).

Is it possible to flip the calculations and show idiosyncratic change over time (e.g. the Macintosh performance per year relative to Macintosh history)? I suspect it will be much easier to recognize changes in the platforms. Though uncertainty could probably be introduced as many final sales numbers are created based on projections as well.

Nano computers are here. Phones are important. We just don't use them to talk any more. So what are they? personal buddies, assistants. the trouble is, I don't want a personal assistant designed by Zuckerberg, or Paypal, or Zappos. Where's the person with taste?

the reason iphones took the planet by storm is simple. People enjoy tasteful, elegant, thoughtful devices. The 'rush' to make money, beat the next guy out with the 'thinner' thing, or the brighter thing, well. who cares? Designers in most companies miss that.

Like communities rushing for gigabit service, getting faster and more, that's tasteless, tough, poorly presented is like super-sizing a meat-burger, but getting an even bigger one. Healthier, tastier, enjoyable?

Too much junk is made to be faster and have more 'tech' in it. Microsoft has been king of that since day one. Most things don't work when first released. Its like saying my burger will taste better after I eat 100 of them. yeech. Make a really good one to start with.

Today, tech is really an enabler. Designers can build the most delightful time savers, and life enhancers.

I'm going to say that the author here must be far too young to have "been there".

I like being thought of as young, but sadly I'm not. I turned 40 early this year.

Quote:

As evidence I offer the gross misuse of the term Personal Computer. That term wasn't pertinent to what he refers to as "The personal computer (Triassic Period)". Those weren't personal computers, they were 'microcomputers'.

You are correct that the term at the time was "microcomputer", to distinguish between mainframes and minicomputers. The term "Personal Computer" came later, and of course IBM co-opted it for the name of their own machine, which ended up being the dominant platform, so the term "Personal Computer" ended up being the dominant term for those sorts of machines. I remember online debates in Usenet over whether or not "PC" was just a term for IBM-compatible machines, and fans of Amigas and Atari STs being quite adamant that their machines were personal computers too.

If I was writing the article in the 1980s, I would probably have used the term "microcomputer" instead. It's funny how language changes like that.

After such a thoughtful story, comments loaded with hand-waving speculation are hilarious.

I'm glad you thought the story was thoughtful! I'm actually quite pleased with the comments so far, however. I was a bit worried that they would be largely full of fanboys of one side or another arguing over numbers, but instead they have been quite thoughtful as well.

Can we get a source for these numbers? They seem way off considering other numbers I've seen.

The recent numbers (for both phones and computers) are all from IDC and Gartner (they always differ by a bit, but are fairly close to each other). For the very early PC years, I had to piece together the data from various press releases and industry reports, eliminating conflicting reports and interpolating between data points to get the missing data.

Over the years I've received minor corrections on my original PC numbers and I've updated them, but they have never been "way off". Remember that they are worldwide figures over all sales channels.

Microsoft gave away their OS also. It was trivial to get a friends, coworkers, use a serial number generator to validate your copy of windows. Most of the developing world did the same. Getting the young people to buy a $600 box to play on was a winning strategy. Games too.

Microsoft made money on the enterprise and small businesses, where improvement in efficiencies allowed Microsoft to charge a very high value added price.

Now everything has switched around. Google is now giving away their OS. Apple now has the supply chain and profits and price points. Maybe one day they will switch their gears to the PC.

The PC will be around in the long term, computing gets more and more easy to put in enough power into a small form factor to run good. Things will only get smaller and will change what you call a PC.

Jeremy -- One of interesting facts that jumps out of your number is that the Apple ][ was never as dominant as Apple's advertising implied that it was. In fact, the original ][ model seems to have been a bit of a flop, and the platform didn't really catch on until the ][+ series (disk drives, Applesoft, etc.)

However, Apple had a big chunk of the edu market, especially in wealthier parts of the US, so that equated to "mindshare".

"The truth is that technologies rarely if ever actually vanish from the planet. IBM still sells both mainframes (its System Z units) and minicomputers (the AS/400 line, which became Power Systems),"

IBM has manufactured 4 different lines of servers. S360/370/380/390 now known as Z server, AS/400 now knwon as I server,. RS/6000 now known as P server, and IBM PC now known as X server. IBM was relatively late to market with the AS/400 compared with competitiors like DEC, Data General, and Wang. It was also late with AIX and the RS/6000 compared with other Unix based systems like Sun and Apollo. But IBM has sustained these businesses longer compared with those like Sun who are gone and several others who have disappeared into the bowels of HP. The Power series hardware was originally developed for the Unix based RS/6000. The OS/400 base AS/400 had its own series of IBM proprietary hardware. I believe that both the P server and I server lines use the same hardware today. Probably, the same stream of hardware development is largely used for the Z server too.As far as the time line of the uptake of the early PC's goes, it may have had something to do with the fact that the original IBM PC cost somthing like $5,0000 and did not do that much that was too useful.The future of computing is likely to be diverse. But I suspect Linux will emerge as the dominant operating system. No doubt people will contnue to be excited about their toys like smart phones. But the more important future of computers will be in scientific research, robotic manufacturing, artificial intelligence, and keeping track of DNA sequences. No doubt, when the history of computing is finally written Apple will have some place in it. But, it will be a small place..

Data shows that smartphones and tablets have been adopted far faster than PCs.

That is a rather misdirected statement.

These cannot be a direct comparison.

When the Personal Computer first came around - 90± percent of the world had no frakkin clue what they were or what to do with them. There was no useful environment outside of technical people or hobbyists or the occasional accountant.

Fast forward to tablets and smartphones - eveyrone has had 30+ years of knowledge and nearly everyday usage on computers - cellphones - PDAs and so on.

You can easily toss your statement at most any industry:

- Online Search was adapted to far faster than Library usage was.- Modern cars were adapted to far faster thna "horseless carriages" were at the turn of the 20th century.- Cellular Telephones were adapted to far faster than landlines were 100 years prior.- Commercial aviation is more common place today than it was 75 years ago.- People are watching more video-based media today then they were during the TV-only era or back when "moving pictures" first came around.- People are listening to more music since the iPod came around than when the Walkman first debuted in the early 1980s.

Up until around 100-150 years ago bathing everyday was unheard of if once per month - these days you'd almost be ostracized for not bathing every day.

The interesting thing is that despite the almost two decade 95%+ marketshare of Windows, at least two other platforms – Linux and Mac – consistently remained capability-competitive with Windows. In other words, there were never very many things you could do with a Windows machine that you could not do with a Linux box or a Mac. If the network effect theory were right – if the utility of a computer system really was dependent on how many people use that system, Mac and Linux would never have survived (let alone continued to flourish).

Well Apple was near death, but got a cash injection from MS. They also hold a strong standing in the media world (one that seems to be eroding now that i-devices are selling as they do).

Linux on the other hand can exist independent of market share. Especially when you can mold the base to fit on anything from supercomputers to phones. The one play MS have fought against its entry is the desktop, as that is the core of the MS network effect. MS can market Windows and Office to corporations based on the workforce already knowing it at home, and at home because experience will make one a more likely hire. Never mind the whole office network thing with Exchange, Active Directory and lately Sharepoint. Hell, MS Office is kinda like a RAD for smaller businesses thanks to the built in scripting.

Could be that Android (hello moldable Linux) can have some effect tho. Google recently bought a company that made a mobile office suite. And there is indication of multi-user support in future versions of Android. The really big killer will be if they can also pull in the tricks that Asus is doing with the Padphone alongside the recently side by side apps demoed by Samsung for their upcoming tablet.

Could be why MS is trying for a one OS, one interface with Windows(phone)8.

It's interesting to note that the great innovator Samsung is not mentioned in this article but the copyist Apple is. Given that Apple contributed nothing to the industry and just patents obvious ideas. Ars should not give such credit to patent trolls like Apple. The iphone and ipad were nothing special. Everything in them were obvious. Anyone could have told you in 2007 that phones would be like the iphone. Nothing was changed. There was no evolution. The same goes for the ipad it was completely obvious (rounded rectangles LOL!). Ars needs to be less biased towards Apple and talk more about true innovation from Samsung.

Copying other peoples products isn't innovation. And Samsung has been a copycat for their entire existence. If the iPhone and iPad were so obvious, then why wasn't anyone else there to make them first? Feature phones don't count. Neither do poorly performing tablets trying to run a desktop OS.

It was actually a joke post . Although in retrospect, it is sad that it is hard to tell the difference between a joke and an actual Samsung supporter.

It isn't fair to mention the iPad and forgot about tablets like the Nexus 7. Seriously, have you tried one yet? $200 gets you one of the smoothest and most capable touch devices ever to hit the market PERIOD. It rivals the iPad on every facet and is 50% of the price or more cheaper.

The iPad has been around for years, completely dominated tablet sales and totally changed the game. The Nexus 7 is just one month old and it's a nice 7" tablet but hardly anything groundbreaking

The article, and the interpretation people make of the number are entertaining, but flawed...

Sales numbers are interesting, profits on the other side are what make a successful company or a dying one.

This is where the new Apple is pretty interesting. Their strategy since 1997 as allowed them to go from a company losing money to a company that turns more than 24% of its revenue in net profits!I don't think a lot of people realise how efficient Apple is being!

In 2011 the entirety of Samsung turned 146 Billions$ into 12.15 Billion$ net profits that's a 8.32% conversion rate, and that's with a big chunk of parts they sold to Apple.

Another miss in the article is the notion that the post-PC era is about completely eliminating PC from the surface of the earth...Of course PC aren't going away, but one thing is for sure, it isn't a very profitable business.What is going to happen as a lot more people move to upgrade tablets or other mobile devices instead of PC that already fulfil their needs?